© CTR Carinthian Tech Research AG, 2013 http://www.ctr.at The Smart Energy Demo Project Vision Step I – Smart City Villach Rosemarie Velik 1 , Johannes Schmid 2 , Wolfgang Rittsteiger 3 , Andreas Karitnig 4 , Doris Wilhelmer 5 , Erwin Smole 6 1 CTR Carinthian Tech Research AG, 9524 Villach/St. Magdalen, 2 ALPINE-ENERGIE Österreich GmbH, 4030 Linz, 3 SIEMENS AG Österreich, 1210 Wien, 4 RMA, 9524 Villach/St. Magdalen, 5 AIT Austrian Institute of Technology, 1220 Wien, 6 PwC Österreich Gmbh, 1030 Wien Introduction Acknowledgement: This work has been co-funded by the “Klima- and Energiefond” within the program Smart Energy Demo - Fit4Set (project Vision Step I). Stakeholder Involvement Operation of Low-Voltage Electricity Grids Integration and Operation of Storage Technologies To target the topic of usability and user acceptance of developed concepts and technologies, the project Vision Step I involves stakeholders from the very beginning. This is achieved via the following measures: • Interactive LIVING Lab workshops with interested tenants are taking place on a quarterly basis targeting knowledge exchange and network-learning (see Figure 8). Representatives of the city of Villach, the housing associations, energy providers, and technical experts are an integrative part of these workshops to guarantee the impact on future activities. The workshops implement the user innovation approach of mutual learning targeting at increasing the usability of technical solutions as well as at mobilization of civil society and testing effectiveness of new modes of governance set ups for European cities. • An ICT-based social network for energy savers (Smart City Energy Club) is established with the objective to enhance smart citizens’ active participation, offer comprehensive information on individual energy consumption, and to enable the citizens to interact with the community. • The change of tenants’ social profiles – related to the energy use – is surveyed via interviews in the beginning and in the end of the project in order to identify options for proactive changing of energy consumption. • The impact of implemented tenants’ actions on achieved energy savings are reviewed using EE data collections within the Living Lab workshops and lessons learned are drawn in order to replicate achievements in the future. Besides the decreasing of governmental funding of regenerative energy sources and the increasing costs of electrical energy, mainly the non-predictable behaviour of regenerative energy sources including the non-synchronism of generation and usage could make electrochemical storage systems coupled to PV systems attractive for future grid architectures. The project Vision Step I focuses on the integration of storage devices into PV household installations to investigate household scenarios and grid supporting possibilities, considering also the cost-effectiveness of such systems. In the first year of the project, the focus was put on household scenarios. First results are presented in the following. Fig. 8: Pictures of stakeholder workshops Latest insights gained in the fields of smart grids, smart cities, and renewable energy show that making upcoming technologies affordable and attractive will require novel financing concepts and business models. Therefore, the project Vision Step I has the objective to develop and analyses novel financing concepts and business cases in this context. Approaches targeted include: • Crowd funding of small scale projects: e.g. for PV installations on the roof of residential complexes • Renewable and energy efficiency funds: establishment of regional funds where citizens can invest into renewable energy and energy efficiency projects with a strong local/regional focus • Smart incubator for new concepts and business cases: establishment of an incubator within whose framework innovative concepts and business cases should be developed for innovative technologies Further Project-Related References [1] R. Velik, K. Kafka, L. Neumaier, J. Schmid, H. Pairitsch, W. Egger, J. Silva-Martinz, Design of a PV-Supplied, Grid-Connected Storage Test Bed for Flexibly Modeling Future Energy Scenarios, Smart Grids Week, 2013. [2] R. Velik, Battery Storage versus Neighbourhood Energy Exchange to Maximize Local Photovoltaics Energy Consumption in Grid-Connected Residential Neighbourhoods, IJARER International Journal of Advanced Renewable Energy Research, Volume 2, Number 6, 2013. [3] R. Velik, The Influence of Battery Storage Size on Photovoltaics Energy Self- Consumption for Grid-Connected Residential Buildings, IJARER International Journal of Advanced Renewable Energy Research, Volume 2, Number 6, 2013. Figure 2: Self usage as a function of annual consumption and plant size for typical household scenarios in Austria Figure 3: Self usage as a function of available battery capacity and plant size for typical household scenarios in Austria Figure 4: Amortisation of a Lithium battery in combination with 5 kWp PV and 4000 kWh/a Figure 5: SOC of a 2kWh storage system combined with a 5kWp PV and 4000 kWh/a Fig. 7: Data sources, analysis, and control from different sources – e.g. also weather conditions – and can therefore amongst others uncover the influence of photovoltaic inverters on PLC communication quality or network reserves in extreme conditions. Fig. 6: Low voltage grid – smart gird components Today, only very few smart meters facilitate smart grid operation support features in addition to pure metering functions. Nevertheless, huge opportunities could be opened by such features. One example is the support of the handling of complex voltage situations faced by distribution network operators in the low voltage electricity grid due to photovoltaic or wind turbine infeed (see Figure 6). To gain a profound understanding of the low voltage grid in such complex decentralized infeed situations, long-term measurement data are the basis, e.g. in combination with comprehensive simulations. In the project Vision Step I, a smart grid metering system comprising features beyond classical metering (see Figure 7) is developed and rolled out in the test area Demo Site (see Figure 1). The project Vision Step I – Smart City Villach is a 3-year research initiative funded by the “Klima- und Energiefond” to prepare Villach for the newly upcoming challenges in urban electricity supply by addressing this topic holistically from a technological, economical, and socio-ecological perspective. The goal of the project is to develop an integrated smart-city-concept, which increases energy efficiency, the amount of produced renewable energy, and user acceptance of these technologies. The concepts are implemented and tested in a research test bed as well as in one of Villach’s city districts here referred to as Demo Site (see Figure 1). On the technological level, a detailed investigation and application of novel smart grid and storage concepts is targeted. On the economical and sociological level, concepts for enhancing the smart citizens’ active participation are elaborated, implemented, and evaluated. Fig. 1: Vision step I test areas This includes approaches such as new participatory business and financing concepts for renewable energy systems, a “social network for energy savers” and a LIVING Lab, bringing together citizens and experts from various fields of science and technology. This poster aims at giving an overview about the main topics addressed in Vision Step I and a summary of the project results already obtained after the first year of project runtime. Measurement values from the low voltage grid originating from enhanced meters and a novel grid monitoring device, which acts as repeater for the power line communication (PLC) and can be located directly in connection cabinets at the low voltage feeder, are boosted by the use of a business analytics platform. Applications on this platform will merge and analyze data These findings contribute to an efficient utilization of primary infrastructure and compliance with power quality targets. A further focus topic in the project Vision Step I is the improvement of existing algorithms to control regulated LV-transformers, taking into account that measurement data from the feeder can be delayed or lost under unfavorable environmental conditions. The Vision Step I guideline will be multiplied to interested European cites aiming at a reduction of energy usage independent from the necessity of high investments in technical infrastructure. Figure 2 shows the percentage of usage of self generated PV energy as a function of PV size and annual energy consumption for typical household scenarios in Austria. Next steps: • Optimization of working strategies for the storage system to avoid long periods of empty storage systems (shown in Figure 5). • Integration into grid architecture to increase the penetration of regenerative energy sources and to unburden the grid. Conclusions after the first project year are: • It is necessary to consider the interaction of PV and storage at the design stage of the system. • By increasing the self consumption rate, the profitability of the storage system can be risen. • Figure 4 shows the possible amortisation periods for different storage sizes and costs. Figure 3 shows the percentage of self used energy in dependency of the size of the PV system and the size of the storage system at a given yearly energy consumption of 4000kWh in an Austrian household scenario. Financing Concepts and Business Models